Social media as a platform for participatory design
Abstract
In this paper we explore social media as a new arena for participation. The explorations are informed by an ethnographic oriented PD project that follows a PD method and its process of translation within a digital setting. This process is exemplified through outcomes from a Future Workshop that unfolds on Facebook with a group of participants who feed in to a new design of a digital photo-archive on mobile phones. With an explicit focus on translation and use of this PD method the paper presents experiences and challenges encountered during the process in this emerging PD environment. Within this, the paper looks at facilitation of distributed users, heterogeneity of users, and fluidity of participation. In subjecting the experiences and challenges to related works the paper sheds light upon matters that can serve as resources for future translations of PD methods.
